In the 1880s, Dan Beard--Mark Twain's frequent illustrator, and later the
founder of
the Boy Scouts of America--published The American Boy's Handy Book,
subtitled What to do and How to do it.
Soon after, the distaff Beards penned The American Girl's Handy
Book.
Now, over one hundred years later (and just in time for the holidays) R.
Kent Rasmussen
has issued some further instruction, on behalf of Mark Twain.

Rasmussen, whose recent book, Mark Twain A to Z
(Facts on File, 1995), has been called "the most important Twain
publication event
of the year," now gives us, in Mark Twain's Book for Bad Boys
and Girls,
Twain's version of what to do and how to do it--and it doesn't involve
constructing
pine-branch houses. Twain advised always obeying one's parents--when they
are present.
This book shows what can happen the rest of the time.

Mankind has not changed much since that fateful day in the Garden, when
Adam and Eve
ate of the fruit when they thought the Father wasn't looking. By that act,
the predilection
for mischief has been visited upon their children in perpetuity. Then, as
now, the younger generation is full of energy, needing an outlet. Beard,
in his book,
tried to provide ways to harness some of that for constructive ends, such
as building
flatboats or making kites. But when children are not engaged in such
formal pursuits, and are left to their own devices, the results, as seen in
Rasmussen's book, can
involve anything from a fresh watermelon rind to a borrowed skeleton to a
furtive
smoke.

Many adults yearn for those simpler days. Dan Beard wrote, in his
autobiography,
"I cannot think of it without a conscious willingness to give all I
have acquired
by years of hard labor and experience for the opportunity of living again
my guileless
childhood life in the forests and fields along the shores of old Lake
Erie." Change "old
Lake Erie" to "the Mississippi," and there you have it: what
could pass for an excerpt
from Twain's own correspondence.

The material selected by Rasmussen for Mark Twain's Book for Bad Boys
and Girls
epitomizes this, the spirit of Mark Twain's existence, which his wife,
Livy, captured
in the pet name "Youth." Though he was indeed "the most
serious man in the world,"
Twain's life and writings are indicative of a mind full of mischief, and
Rasmussen
has done an admirable job in editing this sampling.

Who can resist a book that addresses such matters as, "Experimenting
with the Laws
of Gravity," "Not Wasting A Watermelon," and
"Disordering Auntie's Mind"? Some texts
are, inevitably, harvested from Huckleberry Finn
and Tom Sawyer
; but there are selections from less familiar sources, such as the
Virginia City Territorial Enterprise,California Youth's Companion,
and the Galaxy.

The jacket flap of Mark Twain's Book for Bad Boys and Girls
states the Twainy postulate that, "'bad' people are often happier and
more successful
than those who strive to be 'good.'" The word "strive" is suggestive. There are,
then, only two kinds of children: bad children, and bad children who try to
be otherwise. Similarly, Mark Twain drew our attention to "the street
called
Straight," in The Innocents Abroad.

With Mark Twain, however, it's not where you finish, it's where you start.
Where
he started, of course, was in Hannibal. As Twain tells it, it was an early
act of
disobedience that sealed his destiny. "A Shade of Death's Door,"
in Mark Twain's Book for Bad Boys and Girls,
reiterates the particulars of the local measles epidemic featured in
"The Turning-Point
of My Life." It is in the latter piece, however, that Twain attests
that if he hadn't
consciously, defiantly (and quite literally) delivered himself into the
hands of fate, thereby contracting the measles, his literary career might
never have been.
It was being "bad" that ultimately proved to be his ticket out
of small-town life.

There is a lot of Hannibal in this book. Having lived there recently, this
reviewer
can attest to the fact that riverboats still land there, wildflowers still
grow atop
Cardiff Hill--and the currency--the legal tender of youth--still continues
to change
hands: marbles, doll parts, odd bits of string. Such evidence was
occasionally found
underneath my back porch. No doubt the neighborhood children continue to
make strange
pacts, too, from things read about robbers and pirates. As Huck says, in
the present collection, "I've seen it in books, and so of course
that's what we've got to do."

As the title would suggest, the passages in Mark Twain's Book for Bad
Boys and Girls
are about childhood. There would surely be ample material if Rasmussen
were at some
point to edit a volume for nonconformist adults. In the spirit of Stephen
Potter's
witty Gamesmanship: The Art of Winning Games Without Actually
Cheating,
Rasmussen could avail himself of such real-life
"gamespersonship" nuggets as Mark
Twain's unfair advantage over Woodrow Wilson while playing miniature golf
in Bermuda
(this reviewer recently learned that the future President was, at the time,
still
recuperating from an injury that had earlier left him blind in one eye),
and Twain's letting
his cats wander through the midst of a billiard game.

Though it is compact, do not be deceived into thinking that Mark
Twain's Book for Bad Boys and Girls
is a quick read. It is not. There is plenty of text, and much to savor.
The illustrations
were culled from first editions, and there are just enough of them to
provide atmosphere
without seeming extraneous. The touchable pages and attractive cover make
for a tasteful, overall presentation. Mark Twain's Book for Bad Boys
and Girls
is a pleasure to hold as well as to read.

R. Kent Rasmussen's Mark Twain's Book for Bad Boys and Girls
is the perfect gift for Christmas--or for anyone, for that matter. It is a
delightful
volume and, it has been said, is much better than coal. And, this reviewer
would
add, it burns with a truer light, the light of a youthful spirit.